


Pros and Kons

by quipquipquip



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-24
Updated: 2011-12-24
Packaged: 2017-10-28 00:53:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/301950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quipquipquip/pseuds/quipquipquip
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tim and Kon (try to) go to see an orchestra. It doesn’t go as planned, but mostly because Kon is the one doing the planning. This takes place a bit after the kiss in Sunday Morning.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pros and Kons

The weeks following The Kiss were some of the most confusing and stressful in Conner's life thus far. Considering how checkered and insane the life of a superhero got---with all the deaths, rebirths, reinventions, alternate universes, and what have you---that was _saying_ something. The thing of it was, Kon could handle the rest of that stuff, no sweat, because he was one of the strongest and most durable people alive.

But he was still a human, prone to human emotions and human confusion and human frustration. Ever since The Kiss, not a single day had gone by where he wasn't reminded of that fact.

For once, it was hard as hell to figure out where he and Tim stood. They weren't just friends, but calling each other their boyfriend felt a little too weird---territory that was too far off the beaten path for either of them. They were _something,_ and it was an important something, but it didn't have a name or a definition yet.

Conner scrutinized situations in ways he'd never done before. He was crazy aware of Tim---of how much space was between them, of where he rested his long thin hands, of what his sharp blue gaze was zeroed in on. They hung out a couple times a week at least, but he couldn't figure out where hanging-out-as-friends ended and hanging-out-as-whatever-it-is-we-are-now. He'd never thought about it when they did things together, back in life before The Kiss. Now, he spent half his time with Robin trying to figure out double meanings and ulterior motives. A part of him felt like any outing together could have been a date, even though they hadn't gone out on any yet. He had no idea what, if anything, was okay for him to do.

Because Kon was a handsy guy. He liked touch. He liked touching his lovers, spreading his palms and fingers wide and feeling how they were put together. That was the thing he liked most about getting to know a new partner---feeling how they moved, how they worked, and using his TTK to hold them all together. You couldn't get closer to someone than that.

But Tim wasn't big on closeness. His old friend was the opposite of touchy-feely, and he respected that---he'd worn down his personal bubble over the years by sheer force of determination, but there was a difference between a friendly pat on the shoulder and, well. Everything else.

Conner didn't like to think that hard about anything, much less a friendship that had been one of the most important ones in his life. And yet, it seemed like he spent all of his free time thinking about it.

Maybe it would've been easier, had they not been living together. They were sharing a swanky-ass studio apartment in Metropolis---paid for by the nigh-endless inheritance that Tim had gotten from the late great Bruce Wayne. Oestensibly, they were sharing the place as friends---roommates. But they'd left their safe territory as soon as Tim had kissed him in the Kents' corn field. There was no getting away from that.

Any other time, with any other person, it'd be easy. He'd take that kiss as a green light, and further manhandling would be go. But with Tim, human interaction was a permanent yellow light--- _caution_ \---which made people either rush him or stop a respectable distance away. If you wanted to get close to Tim and stay there, you had to approach at a crawl, always keeping in mind that the yellow light might turn to red at any time, and without any warning.

Kon was wired for touch---fairly literally, really. His TTK had one major rule, and it'd been a prevalent theme in his life: whatever he touched, he could control. Touch was insanely important to him, because with touch came power and understanding. When he cared about someone, he touched them. He never thought about whether or not it was okay to touch them, to steal bites of sandwiches, to brush their hair out of their eyes, to trace smile-dimples with the pads of his fingertips. He touched without thinking about it, because touch came before thought.

But that was too much for Tim. Kon knew that, so he reined himself in---as difficult as that was for him to do. Tim wouldn't have been so prickly and cautious usually, but the last three months had viciously shaken up his entire world, and he was still struggling to sift through the jagged-edged pieces of what he had left. He was all healed up, physically---he still favored his right arm, since the cast on the left had left the muscles weak---but the mental aspects of the trauma had a strangle hold on him.

Kon tried to be patient. He tried so, so hard. He tried to let Tim set the terms, to bring it up when he was ready for their something to start being _something_ , but after a full month of _nothing_ he started to despair. If he waited for Tim to take control of things, they'd be forty before they got past the short, dry kiss stage. There were pros and cons to pushing him, so he had to be careful. And he really wasn't all that great at being careful.

Of the two of them, Tim was the planner. That didn't mean that Kon was incapable of hatching a scheme or two, though---especially when potential nookie was on the line.

But it wasn't about the sex that they weren't having. That was a part of it, sure---he liked sex, he liked having sex, and he liked Tim, so the marriage of these things had been on his mind more and more often since The Kiss---but it wasn't the largest motivator for him.

Tim Drake-Wayne was one of the saddest people he'd ever known. When he got low, he got _low_. Conner absolutely hated it when life ground him down under its great godly thumb, so he was determined to do whatever it took to make his friend happy again. Considering that he'd lost his family and had been driven out of town by his psycho brother, _happy_ Tim was a tall order.

 

*

 

"Hey." Kon stretched out his leg, brushing Tim's bare calf with his toes. "Hey, hey, hey. S.B. to R.R., requesting your attention, over."

Tim surfaced over the top of his laptop screen, plucking out his earbud headphones and arching an eyebrow in question.

"I told you that I'm not going to google cheat codes and hints for you. Figure it out on your own. You can't complain about how expensive video games are if you cheat your way to the end as quickly as possible."

"Shockingly, I don't want to use you for your open laptop and google-fu," Kon snorted, not looking away from the screen. He kept his foot touching Tim's, just because warm skin felt good and he hadn't moved away. "I just remembered that I had something I wanted to ask you."

Tim saved whatever it was he was working on---he'd learned a long time ago not to ask, because the complicated explanations of all the nerdy projects that Tim plinked away at in his free time bored him to tears---and closed the lid of the laptop.

"What's up?"

Still mashing buttons with one hand, he leaned forward a little and got his wallet out of his back pocket. He'd been keeping the tickets in there for the better part of a week, but he'd had a hell of a time figuring out the right way to bring it up. Since the concert was tomorrow, he'd defaulted to Pretend It's Not a Big Deal mode.

"I, uh," he waved the little pieces of paper at him, holding his breath for his reaction. "Someone gave me these tickets to the opera or something, and I thought you'd like to go. 'Cause it's, y'know, kind of _your thing."_

"The leisure activities of rich people are 'my thing' now?"

"Bingo. Rich people things, nerd things, and Bat things---all yours, little buddy."

Tim took the tickets, holding them carefully pinched between his thumbs and forefingers.

"Someone gave you tickets to the _Metropolis Symphonic Orchestra?"_

"Yeah, I got 'em as a thank you for not flattening some pricey real estate," he said, not looking away from the television screen. It was a lie, but he didn't care if Tim figured that out or not. "Evil robots were rampaging through the financial district. You know how it is. Save the day, get paid in useless merch."

"They gave you tickets," Tim repeated, sounding thoroughly unconvinced.

"It's amazing what kind of generosity my heroism inspires," Kon said with a blithe grin. Tim totally knew he was full of shit, but if he didn't call him on it, he wasn't going to say that he'd thought long and hard about where he'd want to go out on a date---or that it was a date at all. It was easier if they didn't call it a date. Easier if it looked like it'd been an accident, and not a deliberate and possibly-romantic gesture.

Tim turned the tickets over. Leave it to him to read everything, even the small print.

"Brahms, huh?"

Kon shrugged. "I don't know who's playing. You know I don't listen to that stuff. Not everybody's got a love affair with ancient dead white guy music, man."

It was easier if he pretended that he _hadn't_ scoured Tim's prodigious Itunes library for his most-played music. Easier to act like this was just another outing, and not A Date.

Tim didn't say anything for an overlong moment. He just started at the tickets, brows drawn together in a faint worry-crease. Kon had been hoping for a little more enthusiasm than that---he'd put a _lot_ of thought into the whole shebang, which was new for him. Usually, he didn't have to branch out from burger joints and movie matinees. That kind of stuff didn't seem... _right_. Not for A Date with Tim. They'd seen thousands of movies together, and had hit up every vendor of greasy edibles in Gotham, Smallville, and Metropolis twice over. He wanted to do something different, because Tim was different---and whatever it was they had going on between them was different, too.

Kon paused the game, clearing his throat. As zoned-out as he was, the sound made Tim jump. He blinked rapidly, then took a deep breath.

"You don't really want to go to this, do you?" He asked, flicking a quick look at Kon. Kon shrugged again.

"I could be convinced to go, I guess," he said magnanimously. "I mean, _you_ wanna go, right?"

Tim's lips thinned and paled as he pressed them together. Worry-lines tugged at the corners of his mouth.

"Yeah, it's just." He stopped, exhaling hard. "Around the holidays, Dick, Bruce and I would go and see the Gotham Symphony Orchestra together. Bruce was always big on music, so it turned into this..." He rubbed the back of his neck, looking pointedly away. "...tradition. Kind of. As much of a tradition as we had, at least. And after he died, Dick made a point of keeping it going with me. And it---it just hit me that---this year is..."

Tim couldn't finish the thought. His throat worked as he swallowed, with difficulty. Kon could hear his heart drum hard against his ribs, a spike of emotion that didn't make it to the surface.

This was the first year that Tim wouldn't be able to spend Christmas in Gotham---and even if he had been able to, he would spend it alone. Dick was gone, and Bruce was dead.

And Kon had reminded him of it in one of the worst ways possible.

"Sorry," Tim said with a huffed sigh, working his hand through his hair. "I'm being stupid."

"Are you kidding? I'm pretty sure I've got the monopoly on stupid here," Kon muttered, feeling his ears prickle and burn with shame.

He should've _known_ that---should've realized that he'd be reminding Tim of everything that had changed in the last year of his life, and everything that he'd lost in the years before. This was not a new thing for Kon---seemed like he went into a lot of things with the best intentions, and only managed to rack up hurt feelings and insane property damage. "Sorry. I didn't...didn't _think."_

"I still want to go," Tim said finally, looking at him sidelong. His tone was careful, quiet, and guarded. "If you want to."

That made Kon's stomach warm and flop around a bit. It was weird, getting those butterflies from his old Boy Wonder and finally accepting that they were real and valid and good. For so many years, he'd chased that feeling away with a firm _no way, no how, stop looking at his butt in those tights, do you really want that butt anyway? You like boobs. Boobs are great. Tough nuts, kid: you don't_ get _to want that birdbutt._

"Are you sure?"

"How else are you going to get introduced to culture?" Tim asked, and handed him back the tickets. He smiled wanly.

And it wasn't much of a smile---just a faint upturn to the corners of his mouth, his frown-lines smoothing out---but it was a start. Kon couldn't help himself from leaning into him, pressing the flat of his palms to his cheeks and squeezing until his face puckered up. Tim looked like a mildly annoyed chipmunk.

"What would a guy like me do if he didn't have a guy like you around to educate him in the finer things in life?" He said with a wide, winning grin. Tim spluttered, pushing his hands away, but his laughter was _completely_ worth invading his personal space.

 

*

 

The concert was a big, fat, fucking _failure_. He knew that the whole thing was out of his hands, and that it wasn't his fault that a group of evil robots had trashed the place and canceled the show, but he did feel a tiny bit responsible. It was a solid reminder that fibs had a habit of coming back to bite a guy when he least expected it. They'd been out of the city---League business; always League business---so they hadn't heard the news until they showed up and found a whole lot of yellow tape and darkened box office windows.

 _And this is why I'm not the Plan Guy,_ Kon thought tiredly as he almost literally watched his agenda for the evening break up and float away. He tried to do things the right way, but there were some aspects of life where having the ability to leap over tall buildings and deflect bullets did jackshit.

They'd gotten dressed up and everything. He'd chucked his jeans and t-shirt for the evening, letting Tim clean him up into a respectable boyfriend, and for what?

"So, this sucks," Tim said mildly, the first to break the silence. He looked sharp as hell in his tie and suit jacket, all long, lean lines and angles. Kon had been hoping to see him in his penguin suit a little bit longer. Tim gravitated toward baggy, shapeless t-shirts and jeans when he was at home, so to see him in something that showed off the inverted triangle of his strong shoulders and narrow waist was---

Good. It was good, and Kon liked it. He liked seeing him in a polished two-piece suit, and he liked seeing him in a lot less, and he just liked _him._ And he wanted him to like him back, and to want him the same way, and to just be happy. But he couldn't find words for that. When Tim had asked him how he looked, all he'd given him was _good._

Kon's throat tightened up and itched. "Well. They were freebies anyway, so. No big deal."

"Conner," Tim said patiently, in that _your wrongness is adorable_ tone of his. "I know that you bought those tickets. Give it up already."

He sighed, scrubbing his fingers through his short hair.

"Can't blame a guy for trying."

"For trying what? To take me on a nice date?" Tim asked, giving him a smile that he didn't have to coax out or tease into existence.

And there it was. The _D_ word. He'd known all along.

Stupid smart Detective Wonder.

Kon sighed again.

"Yeah. Apparently, I suck at this. Which is news to me, you know? I thought I was good at dates."

"You are good at dates," Tim said, taking something out of his pocket. It was his Ipod, his earbud headphones neatly wrapped around the frame. Tim was the only person he knew who carefully wrapped up wires before he put them away. He was just so _Tim._ "And this was a good date---a great idea. When they finish up the repairs, we'll go to the orchestra together."

"But that'll be like...months. At least. And this date was supposed to be tonight, but those stupid fucking _robots---"_

"Chill," he said, waving him off with his free hand. "I've got a plan."

When his Robin strung them together, those were Kon's four favorite words.

"I'm all ears," Kon said, crossing his arms over his chest.

"I said that I'd introduce you to some culture, and you..."

Tim's very blue eyes flicked up to look at him, and when Tim looked at him, he really _saw him_. Kon couldn't quite describe what it was that made it different from the way other people looked at him, but it was. Tim knew him inside and out---knew all of his names, knew what the murky soup of his genetics looked like, knew how he'd been born, knew why he'd been born, knew who he was and who he tried to be. He saw way, way deeper than the surface. He saw more than what Kon saw when he looked at himself in the mirror.

He saw someone better, at least. And Tim was so sure of who Kon was, it was easier to believe that he was right.

"You said that you wanted to take me on a nice date," Tim went on, after a pause and a breath. "So if you'll make with the up up and away, I'll make with the music."

He arched up in his loafers, slipping one of the headphone buds into Kon's ear. His callused thumb brushed the line of his jaw, light but purposeful; it made Kon's mouth go very dry. Tim put the other headphone in his ear, the pale blue glow of the Ipod screen illuminating the curve of his smile as he scrolled through his playlists.

The opening notes of the score swelled in Kon's left ear. Tim had lowered the volume for him, forever mindful of his sensitive hearing. Tim thought about _everything_ that he did, which amazed him in small ways.

Kon put an arm around his waist, quickly casting a look around to make sure nobody was watching. The coast was clear, so he streaked up into the night sky. He pushed his TTK field to envelop Tim---through the hand spread across his stomach, the arm Tim had slung around his neck, and the thin white headphone wire connecting them to the music and to each other---and kept him snug against him. The mid-August night was warm and muggy, so it felt good to hover up above the cloud cover, between the smog of the city below them and the pinprick points of stars above them. The air was cooler, rarer; he breathed in a deep lungful and glanced at Tim.

Fingers of warm wind combed through Tim's long bangs, ruffling his hair. He looked down at the hundreds of thousands of jewel-bright lights of Metropolis and smiled.

"What're we listening to?" Kon asked, his breathing slowing to match Tim's. The TTK lined them up and made them extensions of each other. Some people didn't like to be held by his TTK, and would rather risk slipping out of his grip. He understood that---he got that there was something kind of intimate about it, since whoever he included in the field _felt_ it. It was a full-body pressure, a faint awareness, kind of like being submerged underwater.

But Tim had never minded it. When Kon had asked---way, _way_ back when there'd been no Red in Robin and he'd still worn a leather jacket---Tim had shrugged evasively and said that it made him feel safe. Robin liked to fly, but feared falling. With that tingling pressure skating over his skin, he could let go of that fear.

"Brahm's Symphony Number Three in F Major," Tim said, turning that smile on him. It was rare, but it had the power to make Kon's chest tighten up until his heart squeezed. "Hang here a minute, will you? I want to talk, but I don't want to risk swallowing bugs."

Kon snorted. Even flying had its unglamorous aspects. He hovered, offering Tim his hand. He took it, so he held onto his hands and swung him out in front of him. Held in the TTK field, he hung weightlessly, the headphones stretched between them.

"I know you don't have an ear for music, but you've got one for everything else, so listen for a sec," Tim instructed. "Hear that motto? _F-A-flat-F?_ When he wrote this, Brahms was fifty years old and still a bachelor. A friend of his, Joseph Joachim, had _F-A-E_ as his motto. It encapsulated his life--- _frei aber einsam._ 'Free, but lonely' in German. Even though he didn't have anyone, Brahms maintained that his motto stood for _frei aber froh_ : ''free, but happy'."

Kon could pick out the notes. He nodded, opening his eyes.

"After... _everything,_ I had this moment," Tim continued, _looking_ at him. "An epiphany or something, I don't know. I realized that I was free---I didn't have to be Robin or Batman or anyone else anymore. I thought that everything keeping me in the tights was gone. My family, my motivation...gone. And it terrified me, Kon. The epiphany wasn't that I was free, but that I didn't want to be free from the responsibilities of the cape and cowl. I was free, but lonely as hell. It was the year I lost you and Bruce all over again."

"But I came back," Kon pointed out carefully.

"Yeah," Tim said, sighing deeply. "And just like that time, you found me and reminded me that the loneliness was in my head. So, I. Because of you, I...I know that I'm not easy, and this isn't easy for you, but it..."

He trailed off, brows rucked together as he willed him to just _get it._

"F-A-flat-F," Kon said, and grinned. "'Cept, you're not really 'free', man. You've got me. I'm not going anywhere. And even if I do, you'd better believe I'll find a way back. I'm good at that. It might actually be one of my powers."

Tim slid his hands up his arms, never breaking the contact connection, and framed his face. Most people clung to him tenaciously when they were airborne, even though they could feel the TTK holding them. They could feel it, but most people didn't trust it. Tim did, though he kept the connection with just his fingertips against the curve of his cheekbones.

Kon pulled him in close. Tim spread his knees, legs wrapping around his middle. He slipped Kon's glasses off, folding them up neatly and slipping them into the breast pocket of his jacket.

"This is where I kiss the bejeezus out of you, right," Kon said, trying very hard to tell himself that no would be an acceptable answer. With Tim's thighs squeezing his sides, it was a little difficult.

Instead of answering him, Tim dragged him down and nipped the corner of his mouth. He kissed him hard, like he'd been holding it in for days. Then again, that was a pretty good answer all on its own.


End file.
